(40l) Application of Safety Triad in Relation to Chemical Hazards

Within the process industries, a large number of incidents occur each year, leading to injuries, deaths, environmental damage, and economic losses. To address these incidents, various hazard analysis techniques are utilized within the process industries to determine barriers and strategies to be implemented within the facilities. However, up to this point, an overarching framework for safety system robustness evaluation has not been established. It is for this reason that the late Dr. Sam Mannan proposed the concept of a safety triad, which depicts the three layers of an effective safety system. Similar to the fire triangle, which depicts the three ingredients necessary for most fires, the safety triad depicts the three layers of an effective safety system. These layers are prevention, mitigation, and response. The focus of this presentation is on analysis of chemical hazards that are often present within industrial facilities and how they fit within the concept of the safety triad. For analysis of the safety triad, appropriate methodologies for ensuring the robustness of each component are identified and discussed in detail. For identifying potential chemical reactivity hazards within facilities, 33 warehouses containing hazardous chemicals are analyzed. To do so, chemical incompatibility software is used to determine combinations of chemicals that would potentially result in heat or toxic gas generation and the potential gas release offsite impacts are identified. In order to identify the safer operating regions for chemical processes, oxidation reactions of alcohols are investigated. Response surface methodology is used to identify the effects of varied parameters on the heat release as well as on the product yield. Based on the results of these studies, the safety triad is validated as an effective tool for identifying the current robustness of safety systems within the process industries as well as identifying areas in need of improvement.